Written Answers Tuesday 26 August 2008

Scottish Executive

Children

Dr Richard Simpson (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive what steps it is taking to ensure that the proposals in Getting it right for every child , to avoid creating false incentives to make a child subject to competing measures and classifying them looked after and to ensure that children’s needs are identified and acted on, are implemented.

Adam Ingram: The implementation of Getting it right for every child is continuing through pathfinding activity and in partnership with agencies, including development of assessment of children’s risks and needs. Better, earlier identification of risks and needs leading to appropriate, proportionate, timely support should over time lessen the proportion of children requiring support whose needs and risks develop to the point where they require to be looked after children in terms of section 17 of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995.

Education

John Park (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive how much funding has been allocated for the delivery of English for speakers of other languages programmes as non-formal adult learning since May 2007.

Fiona Hyslop: It is not possible to say how much funding has been allocated specifically for the delivery of English for speakers of other languages (ESOL) as non-formal adult learning since May 2007.

  Funding, which is routed through the Scottish Funding Council to Scotland’s colleges (60%), and to community learning and development partnerships (40%), is for the overall provision of adult ESOL learning, formal and non-formal.

  In 2007-08 the Scottish Government provided additional funding of £5 million to support the adult ESOL strategy, which was published on 28 March 2007. Further funding of £3 million per annum for the period 2008-11 was announced on 4 February 2008.

  Also, some ESOL learners may be eligible for adult literacies provision funded by adult literacy and numeracy partnerships.

Education

Bill Kidd (Glasgow) (SNP): To ask the Scottish Executive, with a view to encouraging people to become active citizens and to empower them through language skills, whether it plans to extend classes in English for speakers of other languages for refugees and women and long-term residents from abroad.

Fiona Hyslop: The adult english for speakers of other languages (ESOL) strategy for Scotland, launched in March 2007 is for all Scottish residents for whom English is not a first language. This includes migrant workers, asylum seekers and refugees as well as settled minority ethnic communities.

  In 2007-08 additional funding of £5 million was made available to colleges and community learning and development partnerships which has provided over 5,000 new ESOL places. Further additional funding of £9 million over the three-year period from 2008-11 is expected to create a further 7,000 places. Providers have therefore extended classes to the aforementioned groups of residents.

Freedom of Information

George Foulkes (Lothians) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive how many freedom of information requests it has received in the last year and, of these, in how many cases the information was provided and how many cases were referred to the Scottish Information Commissioner.

Bruce Crawford: I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-12302 on 9 May 2008, in relation to the time period 31 May 2007 to 23 April 2008. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search .

  In relation to the number of requests the Scottish Government has received under the terms of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 for the period 24 April 2008 to 29 July 2008, 282 requests were received and of those, 244 responses have been issued. Of the requests that have been responded to, the information was fully released in 131 cases whilst it was partially released in 51 cases. The information was not held by the Scottish Government in 24 instances.

  As advised in the answer to S3W-12302, the number of cases that were referred to the Scottish Information Commissioner can be found on the Commissioner’s website at: http://www.itspublicknowledge.info/home/ScottishInformationCommissioner.asp.

General Practitioners

Rhoda Grant (Highlands and Islands) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive whether NHS Orkney’s plans to reorganise GP cover will be subject to independent scrutiny.

Shona Robison: No. After careful consideration we have concluded that NHS Orkney’s plans to reorganise GP cover will not be subject to independent scrutiny.

General Practitioners

Rhoda Grant (Highlands and Islands) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive when NHS Orkney will be informed whether its plans to reorganise GP cover will be subject to independent scrutiny.

Shona Robison: The Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing wrote to the chair of NHS Orkney on 16 August 2008 regarding the matter of independent scrutiny for the reconfiguration of GP services.

General Practitioners

Rhoda Grant (Highlands and Islands) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive what the criteria are that will trigger independent scrutiny of an NHS board’s plans to reorganise GP cover.

Shona Robison: Independent scrutiny will only be applied to cases of major service change and only where the benefits outweigh the costs. This will be judged on a case-by-case basis by Ministers and the bar will be set high.

Health

Dr Richard Simpson (Mid Scotland and Fife) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive how many hits the Choose Life website has received, broken down by six month periods since the website was established.

Shona Robison: The Choose Life website has received the following numbers of hits, in six-month periods, since it was established in May 2005:

  

 May 2005 to October 2005
 14,559


 November 2005 to April 2006
 28,804


 May 2006 to October 2006
 41,974


 November 2006 to April 2007
 54,073


 May 2007 to October 2007
 90,070


 November 2007 to April 2008
 161,298


 May 2008 to July 2008 (Three Months)
 77,314


 Total
 468,092

Maternity Services

Mary Scanlon (Highlands and Islands) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will establish a safe and reliable 24-hour national service for the co-ordination and undertaking of in-utero transfers, as recommended in NHS Quality Improvement Scotland’s Perinatal Collaborative Transport Study

Shona Robison: The Scottish Government will now ask the Maternity Services Action Group to consider the study in full, and a range of options to address issues raised in the study.

Maternity Services

Mary Scanlon (Highlands and Islands) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive what research has been done into the financial, practical and emotional implications of in-utero transfers on families.

Shona Robison: Bliss, the premature baby charity, carries out research into the financial, practical and emotional implications of in-utero transfers on families, and will publish a report later this year, which will be specific to neo-natal services in Scotland.

  The Maternity Services Action Group will be asked to consider this report upon publication.

Maternity Services

Mary Scanlon (Highlands and Islands) (Con): To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will review the nursing levels in maternity units to ensure that the extent of in-utero transfers are minimised.

Shona Robison: Workload and workforce planning within maternity services has been ongoing this past year utilising the birthrate plus methodology. The results of this exercise are expected by the end of September 2008. Due consideration will be given to the findings by NHS boards in relation to the impact of midwifery staffing on in-utero transfers.

  Development work is currently underway to further enhance the neonatal workload and workforce tool with a view to the tool being ready for further rollout by April 2009.

Ministerial Code

George Foulkes (Lothians) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive whether the First Minister has made any referrals to the independent advisers on the ministerial code.

Bruce Crawford: No referrals have yet been made to the independent advisers on the ministerial code.

Respite Care

Johann Lamont (Glasgow Pollok) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive how many weeks of residential respite care were provided in 2006-07.

Johann Lamont (Glasgow Pollok) (Lab): To ask the Scottish Executive how many hours of non-residential respite care were provided in 2006-07.

Shona Robison: Audit Scotland publishes information on both residential and non-residential respite provided by each local authority annually on its website at: http://www.audit-scotland.gov.uk/performance/service/ .

Small Businesses

Jim Tolson (Dunfermline West) (LD): To ask the Scottish Executive what support is available to small businesses to help them with employee training and development.

Fiona Hyslop: Small businesses can currently access learndirect scotland for business support through three engagement channels: the web at www.lds4b.com , the National Business Training Advice helpline on 08456 000 111 and the Training Partner service at www.lds4b.com/What+we+do/Training+partners . In addition to these services, the national training programmes funded by Skills Development Scotland have provided support and funding to individuals and businesses for skills development activity in the workplace.